The Keep talk:Habitican Exploration and Research Organization (H.E.R.O.)/Challenge 2:Weapons of Mass Distraction
I’ve never been able to overcome my distractions for a meaningful length of time. The best I can hope for is a temporary respite. Even goals I’ve achieved have been full of distractions; I manage to reach those goals by being able to do enormous amounts of work in a very short time and by using the distractions to my advantage. I’ll explain using a single example: this goal for the HERO challenge, writing a response to “Walking on Frozen Water”. It's part of the “Weapons of Mass Distraction” challenge on Habitica. The goal, of course, is to write about achieving a goal despite distractions pulling me away. Wanna hear a secret? This goal is a distraction from drawing. Yes, that’s right – writing about distractions is a distraction itself. I have only a handful of goals. First, be nice to people (not as easy a task as it sounds, at times). Second, learn to draw well enough to produce my OEL manga “Do-Over”. Third, find a job I can at least live with that doesn’t require me to manage people or work any overtime. Fourth, get my writing submitted it for publication. On the other hand, distractions abound. Primarily these happen because I have ADHD, a pretty severe case, and a chronic case of “I’ll never be good enough.” Not the best combination. Despite all of that I’ve achieved a lot over my lifetime; making a list is pretty enlightening. So here’s my “secret” to achieving goals despite distractions: I work with my ADHD to set my goals as “distractions” and switch between them whenever I need to. I am not always working on a specific goal at any given time, but by switching between them frequently I reach them all. In other words, I don’t avoid distractions – I use them to get work done. Hey, you work with what you have. And with that, I’ve reached the goal of a 250+ word essay on achieving a goal (writing this essay) despite having distractions pulling me away. Dan odea (talk) 14:18, October 26, 2016 (UTC) Challenge 3b - Walking on Frozen Water It was the wee small hours of the morning and the distractions were calling to me. I turned up my Disney tunes and wrenched my attention back to Shakespeare and his uses of language. I could feel a yawn bubbling up behind my teeth but I refused to let it take hold and drag me down. I wrote another sentence, erased half of it and stared at the screen. Disaster had struck. I was going to have to use the online library. I switched to my internet browser and opened a new tab. Before I knew what was happening I was halfway to typing the URL for Facebook. No! I couldn’t afford the distraction. I blinked and erased what I’d written, replacing it with the URL for the Oxford English Dictionary. I knew that I wasn’t going to be able to avoid my distractions for much longer. The stress of the assignment was beginning to overwhelm me and I longed to take refuge in the writings of others on the internet. It was time for a new tactic. I considered my work. I needed to write 1000 more words. I knew how to make this work. Focus for 250 words. Then I would allow myself a short break of no more than ten minutes to do whatever I wanted. Rinse. Repeat. This would work. It had to. My deadline was sneaking ever closer and I needed to get this work done. I took a deep breath and looked at my screen. I would get started. Maybe coffee would be a good idea first. Words: 263 By FrenchKey 00:43, November 4, 2016 (UTC) Walking on Frozen Water I don’t think I’ve ever managed to eliminate a distracting habit. If I stop doing something completely, it’s typically because I’ve lost interest in it, and replaced it with another distraction. I have, however, had some success temporarily suppressing a distraction, or replacing it with something more productive. Usually I just temporarily forgo a distraction when, with a deadline looming, I realize I have to get down to business, but after the deadline nothing changes. Recently I’ve started using Pomodoros to track my productivity. While it hasn’t eliminated my distractions, it has forced me to be more mindful of them. When I hold myself accountable by seeing exactly how much (or how little) time I spent working at the end of the day, it motivates me to do better the next day and spend less time on distractions. I feel this has definitely had an effect on my productivity, and I am more productive than at any other point in graduate school. I’ve also noticed that after I’ve finished my work for the day, the desire to waste time on mindless internet sites drops drastically, which means not only do I have more time in the evening, but I am more motivated to use it on my fun and meaningful hobbies. The distractions aren’t really things I enjoy, they’re just an easy way to try to escape/hide from my responsibilities and the possibility of failure. So while I may never have completely eliminated a time-sink, and maybe I never will, with diligence I may be able to keep them contained. DroseraRegia (talk) 23:09, November 11, 2016 (UTC)Drosera @page { margin: 0.79in } p { margin-bottom: 0.1in; line-height: 120% }